Space station

The second orbital test flight of the Boeing Starliner has been delayed again. The Starliner is designed to ferry astronauts between the Earth and the International Space Station (ISS) and will perform its uncrewed test flight next month. The Starliner test flight was already delayed last month . Originally scheduled for this month, the test flight is now planned for April. NASA says this delay is due to both the recent winter storms in Houston and the need to replace avionics boxes, causing a delay of two weeks. There is also a need to coordinate with the schedule of the ISS, as there is be both a Soyuz launch and a Crew Dragon mission scheduled for the station in April. “Boeing and NASA have worked extremely hard to support an early-April launch but we need to assess alternatives to ensure NASA’s safety work can be accomplished. NASA and Boeing know we fly together,” said Kathy Lueders, associate administrator, NASA’s Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate in a … [Read more...] about Boeing Starliner test flight delayed once again

Astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) are tending to their veggie garden, where they are growing lettuce, radishes, and now mustard greens and pak choi. NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins has taken a lead role in the care and cultivation of the vegetables being grown on the space station in a number of experiments. He harvested the second crop of radishes grown in space , which the crew ate and enjoyed over the new year. He has also worked on two new experiments, one of which was involved the first transplant of a crop in space. When certain plants are lagging behind in their growth, they are rearranged to make the most of the nutrients available in a delicate procedure. Another experiment involved the first planting of lettuce seeds in orbit. Normally, seeds are planted into a nutrient medium on the ground before being sent to the ISS. But the development of a new seed film allows the astronauts to plant crops themselves. Hopkins recently disused the importance of … [Read more...] about ISS astronauts tend to their zero-gravity veggie garden

NASA’s successor to the Hubble Space Telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope, is inching closer to its launch date. Last month, final functional performance tests on the telescope were completed in California. This included the comprehensive systems test which ensured that the internal electronics components of the telescope were working correctly. Data from a previous version of this test was compared with data after the launch environment test so that engineers could check that systems would continue to work after the challenging environment of a launch — which involves factors like extreme vibration, acceleration forces, and swings in temperature. Another test, called the ground segment test, ensured that the spacecraft will be able to send and receive data from the ground. All four of the telescope’s instruments were able to send data to mission operations via NASA’s Deep Space Network. With these tests complete, the telescope is almost ready for its launch in October this … [Read more...] about Hubble successor James Webb Space Telescope is almost ready for launch

As far as we know, the Earth has a unique quality among the planets of the solar system: It is the only planet with plate tectonics , where the crust is made up of plates that float on the mantle. It is thought that this tectonic activity may even be related to the development of life . Global tectonic activity has never been observed on a planet outside our solar system, but now a new study suggests that exoplanet LHS 3844b has interior flows, carrying material from one side of the planet to the other side. One reason tectonic activity hasn’t been observed is because it’s difficult to spot from so far away. “Observing signs of tectonic activity is very difficult, because they are usually hidden beneath an atmosphere,” the study’s lead author, Tobias Meier from the Center for Space and Habitability (CSH) at the University of Bern, explained in a statement . However, this particular planet likely has no atmosphere and has a bunch of other unusual qualities. It orbits close … [Read more...] about Tectonic activity on this exoplanet could mean one half is covered in volcanoes

The Hubble Space Telescope has snapped yet another beautiful image of the wonders to be found out in the depths of space. This one shows the galaxy NGC 2336, a barred spiral galaxy located around 100 million light-years away. It is so picture-perfect that the Hubble scientists refer to it as “the quintessential galaxy.” This galaxy is around 200,000 light-years across, making it twice as wide as our Milky Way galaxy which is around 100,000 light-years across. NGC 2336 also has long arms — the blue-tinted structures radiating out from its center. These arms include regions of star formation, where new young stars are being born when clouds of dust and gas collapse and collapse together due to the force of their gravity. Young stars appear to glow blue because they burn at a higher temperature than older stars. These young stars burn through their fuel more quickly than the redder, older stars which are to be found in the center of the galaxy. This particular galaxy is also notable … [Read more...] about Bask in this glorious Hubble image of a ‘quintessential’ barred spiral galaxy